Kadokawa Group Holdings has announced plans to set up an online pay service in the US offering 200 films from its library beginning this February.

The service will use BitTorrent's peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing software to distribute the titles. Kadokawa's stateside subsidiary, Kadokawa Pictures USA, will handle digitisation of the library titles.

The first 30 titles will become available in mid-February, followed by a further 170 throughout 2007. Titles will include films from the original Ring and One Missed Call franchises with English subtitles.

Through a credit card payment system and logged IP address, subscribers will be able to download the films through BitTorrent's site, which will offer two viewing options. Users can download the entire film with unlimited views for approximately $10. There will also be time-limited single viewing for approximately $3. The website will limit user access to the United States and the contents will be copy-protected.

While P2P file-sharing has long been in use in the west, Japan is only just coming to grips with its use to share pirated music and films. The creator of Japanese P2P software 'Winny' was arrested and is currently undergoing prosecution. Kadokawa's business plan is the first of its kind for a Japanese media company.

BitTorrent has also formed alliances with Hollywood major studios such as Warner Brothers and 20th Century Fox as well as MTV.

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